“He doesn’t remember you,” Geoffrey whispered and Devlin felt the fear wash over him again, his brain working in a whirlwind around him to figure out what Geoffrey had meant. He licked his lips, his brain screaming at him to make everything stop so he could think.

Emma. They had spoken to her briefly about the boy yesterday, but Harry knew she hadn’t really understood. How could she, when he was almost positive she didn’t remember him at all, except for the memories Alex and he had kept in her head, or perhaps simply put there.

"You're afraid of him," Geoffrey said finally, after spending an afternoon dodging questions about the boy. Dumbledore's brow drew together infinitesimally and his blue eyes widened with with what Geoffrey was sure was fiend surprise. He drew his hands from his lap to settle, steepled, upon his desk.

She looked at him for a long moment, her brilliant blue eyes haunting him. There was a sharpness at the edges of them, a knowing and not for the first time Dubhán wondered if what separated him from other child was only his ability to articulate what he was experiencing.

He knew he shouldn't. But knowing he shouldn't, hadn't always stopped him. Potter thought he coward in fear from Voldemort, but Potter hardly knew him. Sometimes there were things that just had to be done and this was one of them.

Normally such a position would make him feel terribly vulnerable, but he thought Harry could have broken his wand and he wouldn't have noticed, because he already felt like his world was crumbling around him.

Dumbledore was imposing and softly-threatening (like a velvet covered knife, hidden between layers of robes and magic), but she was certainly as far from 'threatening' as Dubhán had ever known anyone to be.

He was not the type of person, presented with an opportunity to acquire information, to let it fall between his fingers. Malfoy swayed on his feet, despite Voldemort's charm to keep him upright. It was easier to look him in the eye, this way. *Some of this occures prior to end of last chapter.

"I had the wand," he said, finding that, in this case, it was easier to start at the end rather than the beginning. Everything at the end he had thought of a million times, had meticulously planned before he had partaken. It was all those things in the middle that he tried so very hard not to even approach.